“Cory had one of the biggest hearts, was a real bright light,” Lynch said, her voice filled with emotion and repeatedly breaking throughout the remembrance. As a star of the buzzy Fox comedy, “He knew he was breathing rarefied air,” she said, “always aware that it was a gift.”

Lynch also expressed an admiration for the 31-year-old Monteith’s “adventurous” spirit, saying, “I don’t think he left one day unlived. We lost a really great guy.”

Asked by Tonight Show host Jay Leno how Monteith should be remembered, Lynch shared an anecdote about how the young actor once “flew across the country on his own nickel to meet with a sick kid, whose last wish was to meet him. That’s the kind of guy he was… a real giver.”